


Unswallowed Sea

by Chaotic_Smutty (Anna_Hopkins)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Voldemort Wins, Boys Kissing, Fanfiction of Fanfiction, M/M, TTN Chapter 46, Train to Nowhere - MayMarlow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-18
Updated: 2019-04-18
Packaged: 2020-01-16 04:03:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18513520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anna_Hopkins/pseuds/Chaotic_Smutty
Summary: Sometime after Chapter 46 of MayMarlow's *Train to Nowhere*... Bellatrix is caught pondering the nature of the dynamic between Harry and her Lord. Under pressure, she reveals the memory of her conversation with young Harry at the Yule Ball -- a conversation the Dark Lord didn't know about.She wishes she hadn't.





	Unswallowed Sea

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Train to Nowhere](https://archiveofourown.org/works/294722) by [MayMarlow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayMarlow/pseuds/MayMarlow). 



> I am absolutely in love with MayMarlow's work. This is my latest attempt at writing what has proven to be an intense character dynamic. The idea has been nagging at me since Chapter 46, if not earlier.
> 
> Second chapter to be posted a little later. This is just the lead-up.

“Bella.”

From her place at the round table, Lord Voldemort’s lieutenant gave a mild flinch, the barest possible indication that she had not been paying attention -- but one noticed by most of the assembled Inner Circle, if not all. The Dark Lord was not pleased; it would not do to delay this part of the meaning through her negligence. “I will see your report on the suppression of the rebels in Cyprus.”

See, not hear. Bella’s posture straightened, and she met his gaze immediately, presenting no resistance to his Legilimency.

Normally, Voldemort would not waste time pursuing whatever it was that had distracted her; but as he entered her mind, he caught the tail-end of a stray thought.  _ \--tter _ .

Potter.

_ Harry _ Potter?

As in, his protégé, currently in the library upstairs? Expecting to see some new tidbit of information on Harry’s tutoring, or perhaps a bit of amusing gossip to banter about later, he turned his attentions toward where the thought had gone.

 

In the back of her mind, Bellatrix was afraid. Of all the things for her to be thinking about in a meeting, ponderings on the nature of her Lord’s relationship with Harry Potter -- more specifically, Potter’s relationship with her Lord? This toed the line of blasphemous, in the holy canon of their society.

It didn’t help that she’d been specifically trying  _ not _ to think about it. The effort of pushing thoughts out of her mind was exactly what had caught His eye. And all those thoughts had been pushed into the same figurative  pile -- through which the Dark Lord was now sifting.

 

Voldemort had not felt a need to comb through stray thoughts like this in quite some time. As his power grew, Legilimized minds -- friend or foe -- had generally yielded information without preamble, offering up memories and rumors and stories in neat arrangements for his perusal. The change in pace was refreshing, but after dozens of half-formed thoughts cut off by  _ this is not the time to wonder _ and  _ not now, later _ and  _ damn it stop thinking about this _ , he was beginning to grow bored. A wisp of a connective thought between the pile and a more organized section of memory, further away, guided him to the actual topic of the stray thoughts he had been skimming: a locked drawer, as Bella visualized it, the sort of place for unseemly thoughts. What unseemly thoughts involved Harry Potter? Surely not... _ interest _ ? No, no. It was better not to assume without seeing.

The drawer clicked open without resistance, of course; all defenses were void under his gaze. Inside, a Pensieve (not that he needed it, but he appreciated the gesture) and four bottled memories, each labelled with names. Only one of them had the name  _ Harry Potter _ written on them.

As he reached for it, a chandelier fell from the ceiling, and several bottles of perfume spilled over the chest of drawers.

 

Fumbling for a distraction -- any distraction -- Bellatrix pulled her loyalty, her unrequited affections, her undesirable memories into the Dark Lord’s metaphorical view. Anything to obscure  _ that _ trail of thought. It was possibly the first Occlumency she had ever employed against her Lord, in all her years of service; and she would gladly suffer the Cruciatus, if it meant keeping this one thing hidden.

‘ _ Protective of my protégé, are you, Bella? _ ’ the Dark Lord seemed amused. ‘ _ I do wonder what it is about this knowledge that has distracted you from the purpose of our meeting. And as you must understand, I  _ will _ find out. Indeed, I will allow this lapse in judgement of yours to pass -- if it does not repeat itself. _ ’ And the psychic tendrils reached for the memory again, this time unimpeded; she dissolved the Occlumentic structure protecting individual memories, to make it easier for her Lord, much as she wished she wouldn’t. His will, it seemed, was just that much stronger than hers.

She only hoped he would forgive her.

 

Voldemort’s first action on entering the memory was to freeze it, so that he could orient himself within it.  _ The Third Task _ , he realized almost immediately, seeing the screens and the judges’ box in front of him. He tuned into the thoughts running through Bella’s mind, seeing from her perspective, and let the memory resume motion.

Thrills of excitement and mad joy rushed through him, echoes of his lieutenant’s emotions at the time; she -- ‘they’ -- were watching the large projection of Famagusta, in the moment that Potter’s necromancy was revealed to the crowd. Their eyes were wide in shock, watching the defeat of Regulus Black unfold; but when the boy cast the Dark Mark, Bella had looked to her Lord, in the same instant that he (the him of the memory) had reacted to it.

To prevent impostors, the Inner Circle were all capable of seeing under his hooded cloak. He had forgotten about that in the moment, and let his expression show, unguarded. Bella had seen his face then -- when he’d felt as though punched. The Voldemort of this memory looked...shocked. And delighted. His eyes fairly gleamed with interest.

And in the next moment, when Potter looked to the Dark Lord’s box, arriving in the stadium -- Bella knew,  _ they _ knew, that the boy had done all this only for Him.  _ So his devotion is unchanged _ , she thought,  _ despite my warning. _

And what warning had that been? Indeed, it was the next memory attached to this one.

Adjusting to the shift in perspective and motion, Voldemort swiftly placed himself in space and time: the Yule Ball, in a moment when his counterpart had been occupied with other business across the hall. Bella was dancing with Harry, of all things.

Ah, so this was when she had known for certain that he was training Harry. Bella didn’t seem particularly surprised by that, in the moment; she had clearly been expecting to learn the news at some point. At least Harry hadn’t meant to reveal it: she had simply put the pieces together on her own, something none of his other Inner Circle had yet managed.

“ _ He is the greatest wizard to ever live _ ,” Bella told Harry then. “ _ Do not take his grace lightly, little Harry. His favour is a glorious, but a heavy, burden to carry. I’ve walked through fire and burnt to a husk before he built me up again. It is not easy. The Dark Lord is a leader magic itself honours, and one should take his favour with grave seriousness. _ ” Excerpts of memories flashed through her mind, of battles won and lost, of pain and relief and pain again. Voldemort was reminded that Bellatrix had been in his service for a very long time. Sometimes, he forgot just how long.

“ _ He’s more than that, I think, _ ” Harry whispered then, and the words that followed struck something in Voldemort that he had not anticipated.

 

The art of Legilimency and the art of Occlumency are meant to be taught in tandem, for a very simple reason: Legilimentic bonds between the target and the caster go both ways. The Legilimens bears the effort of both linking to another mind, and keeping his own mind separate through Occlumency; in most cases, this works perfectly well, and the so-called ‘art of mind-reading’ remains straightforward and simple. But just then, the Dark Lord’s control slipped, just a little, and Bellatrix was swept up in the great wave that was her Lord’s reaction.

In the same instant, He regained control and departed from her mind entirely, less neatly than usual; Bella blinked back into awareness just in time to hear the Dark Lord dismiss their meeting until further notice and depart the room first, in a sweep of his black robes.

Unsteadily, she got to her feet and Disapparated back to  _ La Maison Étrange _ , collapsing into a chair in her sitting room. The elf brought wine, and Firewhiskey when she demanded something stronger, and Rodolphus when she demanded company. Her husband was thankfully incurious as to what had set her off; all the better, for she didn’t dare to share it, only pick at it in her mind like a sore spot on the end of her tongue.

She had warned Harry Potter against an infatuation with the Dark Lord, seeing only two real ways it would go: years of pining after Him, and eventually giving up, or an outright rejection that would leave the boy in pieces. She had tried to show Potter what he already had, in the form of his jealous dance partner (a much safer, if schoolyard, romance).

Then the Third Task, and Potter -- Harry, by then -- performed the impossible. Not for the Tournament prize; not for the encouragement of his friends and family; but for  _ her Lord _ . She could not deny it, seeing the Dark Mark emerge into the air over Famagusta. Harry had looked to His throne the moment he arrived; Bella had seen.

Oh, she had seen.

Had seen not only Harry’s expression, but her Lord’s own. That had been the moment she began to question their exact relationship: because the Dark Lord was  _ never _ surprised, and yet he  _ had been _ .

Bella downed another bottle of Firewhiskey, peripherally aware of Rodolphus’ concern for her. He let her lie in his lap and drink away her troubles, just this once, drink and forget.

Forget, forget, forget. Bella wanted desperately to forget.

Because instead of disdain, disinterest or disgust, when her Lord heard Harry’s words about Him, Bella had experienced -- glee. Surprise. Delight. A certain dark satisfaction. And most of all, an overwhelming possessiveness that was most unlike the Dark Lord in its intensity.

Bellatrix reeled at the implication, wished to forget it entirely. The Dark Lord wanted Harry Potter just as much as Harry wanted Him.

And when the Dark Mark burned with her Lord’s sudden  _ joy _ , minutes later -- 

_ Oh,  _ _ no _ _ , _ Bella thought, shuddering.  _ What have I done? _

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on pillowfort: Anna_Hopkins.
> 
> I was going to call this fic Mallow-sweet -- while mallowsweet is a canon magical herb, mallow itself is the English name for Malva, a genus of herbs in the Malvacae family. Many species in the genus are edible as leaf vegetables, and an ancient epigram translated by Lord Monboddo described the practice of planting malva on the graves of the ancients, "stemming from the belief that the dead could feed on such perfect plants." In the flower language, mallow means 'consumed by love'.
> 
> But Unswallowed Sea sounds cooler.


End file.
